Kenyan smart city and healthcare operator Mwale is launching three smart cities across the African continent. Each new smart city will have a major medical centre which will be at the heart of the new city’s economy, and provide jobs and income.

The new cities will be located in Congo, Botswana and Sierra Leone. Mwale is finalising the shipment of new construction equipment for each of the new smart cities. Construction is scheduled to begin in January 2024.

Mwale Medical and Technology City (MMTC) is a community-owned city in Kakamega, Kenya. It is centred around a medical complex with a 5,000-patient capacity Hamptons Hospital, with a research and innovation park in the Plaza district.

Some of the equipment to be shipped in Kenya will also be deployed for construction of large scale affordable housing projects.

The cities will be constructed around development of smart healthcare, agrotech and renewable energy.

“The equipment consists of over two dozen cranes and other high technology construction technologies, that will accelerate the timelines for the construction of new smart cities, that will help Mwale reach a target of constructing 18 smart cities in 12 countries by 2050,” Mwale said in a statement.

Mwale’s existing smart city in Kenya is centred around the Hamptons Hospital which opened in 2019. It treats Kenyans and medical tourists.

The smart city planned for the Brazzaville-Kinshasa metro area will be located within the metropolis of two African capitals: Kinshasa, capital of the Republic of Congo; and Brazzaville, capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo. The metro area is around 20 million people, and is one of the largest urban areas in the world. The new city will feature a Hamptons Hospital and is planned to provide a major centre for healthcare in Central Africa.

A key feature of the Mwale smart city model is building around existing communities, and not displacing them.

In June, Botswana’s Vice President Slumber Tsogwane visited Mwale’s smart city in Butere, Kenya on a fact-finding tour. Tsogwane was accompanied by Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Cooperatives and Enterprise Development Simon Chelugui.

In October 2022, company founder Julius Mwale met Sierra Leone President Julius Bio after a two-week tour of the West African country. Mwale was invited to the West African country by the Sierra Leonean President William Ruto the previous month.

“Our team will invest in a new smart City as an extension of MMTC with a focus on Agriculture, healthcare, energy, transport and manufacturing sectors,” Mwale said in a press statement after the meeting.